More and better space brings Wild Orchid to Dover

Monday

Nov 12, 2012 at 3:15 AM

By Michelle Kingstonmkingston@fosters.com

DOVER — Wild Orchid Baking Company has officially moved into One Washington Center.

After transforming her company from custom baking and retail to operating more like a catering company for desserts, pastry chef and owner Erin Gardner made the decision to move Wild Orchid Baking from its three-year-old North Hampton store to Dover.

The space in North Hampton is ideally suited for retail while the mill space gives Gardner more room for a larger kitchen.

“Dover just made a lot of sense. I had known about this place for awhile and knew a lot of businesses here like White Apron, Rivermill and Stages. This kind of space doesn’t give the illusion of retail and we needed to increase our kitchen size by a lot,” she said. “It wasn’t a move based on location, but just of layout in the space.”

Gardner said when she first started her business, she did some retail and some custom, but the custom side of her business soon took over completely.

“They are totally different businesses. Stocking and maintaining a retail bakery is totally different from custom design orders,” she said. “All of the energy needed to be refocused to that. So, for the past year and a half, we have been doing just custom work and the way the space was divided up was the opposite of what we needed. We had a big space for people to come in and walk around and then the kitchen was less than half the size of our new kitchen here in Dover.”

Wild Orchid Baking Company is located on the first floor of One Washington in Suite 1013. They are a custom cake studio, available by appointment only, and not a traditional bakery which sells day-to-day treats in small quantities. Gardner makes cakes for weddings, birthdays, anniversaries, holidays and private occasions. The studio includes a large work space for a kitchen and a seating area and wedding tasting table for customers working with the company for their special occasion.